Alarm security systems utilize various types of alarm sensor devices mounted in a premises such as a house or business establishment in order to determine if an intruder has breached the premises. As well known in the art, an alarm sensor device will send a signal to a control panel once an intrusion is detected, and the control panel will perform one or more actions, such as sounding a siren and/or transmitting a signal to a central station monitoring service. The central station monitoring service may dispatch security personnel upon receipt of the alarm message from the control panel, for example police or private security personnel may be requested to visit the premises and investigate.
False alarms are sometimes generated by the alarm sensors under certain conditions. These conditions may include environmental occurrences (e.g. a PIR sensor detects a change in temperature in a protected area that is not due to a person entering it) or they may be due to human error (e.g. a homeowner inadvertently setting off the alarm while in the premises). In order to avoid the central station dispatching security personnel unnecessarily as a result of a false alarm, it is desired to be able to utilize an alarm verification process that enables a person at the central station to verify the identity of a person in the protected area of the premises (e.g. to make visual and/or audio contact with the area under surveillance) and make a decision as to whether or not to dispatch security personnel.
Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to provide a security system peripheral device that enables a person at the central station to make visual and/or audio contact with the area under surveillance with an alarm verification unit at the premises and make a judgment as to whether or not to dispatch security personnel.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide such a device that triggers operation of the alarm verification unit only on the occurrence of an alarm condition as detected by an alarm sensor.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a single housing that integrates the alarm verification technology with the alarm sensor(s) that it is triggered by in order to provide ease of installation.
It is a still further object of the present invention to provide a multi-technology alarm sensing device that substantially reduces the occurrences of false alarms.
It is a still further object of the present invention to provide sensing devices that interact with each other with interactive processing.
It is still further object of the present invention to provide an alarm verification unit that may be alternatively triggered by a person at the premises in the event of a panic situation so that central station personnel may provide aid to the person if required.